


Window to the Soul

by ohmytheon



Series: daemons and alchemy [24]
Category: Fullmetal Alchemist - All Media Types, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Alternate Universe - Daemons, Alternate Universe - His Dark Materials Fusion, Daemon Feels, Daemons, F/M, Gen, Halloween, Kid Fic, Parent-Child Relationship, Parental Roy Mustang, Royai kid
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-10
Updated: 2018-02-10
Packaged: 2019-03-16 09:27:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,601
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13633479
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohmytheon/pseuds/ohmytheon
Summary: Riza had asked her son to stay quiet about who his father is, but she can't ask that of his soul. (Daemon AU of my fic, "The Sincerest Form of Flattery".)





	Window to the Soul

**Author's Note:**

> Someone asked if I could write a daemon AU of my favorite Royai kid fic. I never assume that people want more of this super AU, so I got excited when this was requested. Unfortunately I kind of wrote this while I've been drinking so who knows how coherent this is

It was Wojciech that pointed out the problem. Riza had ignored it for as long as she could, but her daemon could not ignore it.

Aidan could pretend to be a regular soldier during Halloween, whatever he wanted, but his soul told the world something different.

He was too young to be able to hide what was in his heart. He was too young to be able to hide the complete truth. She couldn’t expect anything different from him or scold him for it. He wasn’t even four. It broke her heart enough that he had to lie as he did. That Roy Mustang wasn’t his father. That it was just him and her against the world. Wojciech did his best to make up for it and Aidan’s little Atsuko was as proud as any toddler’s daemon could be and more, but…

The moment Aidan put on his Halloween costume, an Amestrian soldier, she saw his daemon change into the form of a lion cub. Riza’s heart staggered and she had to take a sharp breath when she saw her son’s daemon. She looked just like Shula. Proud, elegant, strong. Aidan was only three and yet his daemon could mimic that look.

She had to turn away. Wojciech looked up at her, a wolf’s mournful expression on his face, and he pressed his snout against her stomach. She grasped a hold of him, sliding her fingers through his soft gray fur. He looked as strong as he had been ten years ago, which she took comfort in.

 _You can do this,_ her daemon told her, but it was so hard. All she wanted was for Aidan to be happy and they’d turned this innocent child’s life into some complicated mess. Even worse was that he never questioned them for it and neither did Atsuko. They trusted her and Wojciech implicitly. A child’s trust.

Riza stepped into the living room. “Are you ready to go trick-or-treating?”

She didn’t miss the way Atsuko suddenly changed into a black labrador and then a mouse. Loyal and quiet. His daemon knew what she had done in transforming into a lion cub and Aidan knew that she shouldn’t have done it. Not because Riza would get mad. She wouldn’t. It was only natural seeing as how Roy’s lion of a daemon was unusual. Even Bran’s daemon turned into a lion cub to play with Shula. But Wojciech had noted that Bran’s did it more than Aidan’s, as if Atsuko tried to hide it.

Aidan didn’t bother with responding or asking any questions. He just raised his hands and Riza knew to pick him up. She clung to him tightly, savoring the feeling of his soft body against hers, as he wrapped his arms around her. She could see out of the corner of her eyes how Atsuko changed into the form of a wolf cub, the way she nuzzled against Wojciech. The two daemons were a mirror image of each other.

While they were out trick or tricking, Atsuko was as good of a daemon as she could be. She never turned into a lion. Every time they went up to a door to ged candy, alongside Bran and his ever-changing daemon, Atsuko would change into the form of some puppy dog, playing the role of an Amestrian soldier’s daemon, and they always got extra candy for it. She was sweet. She was gentle. She was good.

Too good.

By the end of the night, Wojciech was frowning at Riza’s side. Her soul felt as heavy as her heart. All Aidan wanted to be was the Flame Alchemist and they had promised him that, but not until the Halloween party at Rebecca’s house. It would be safe there. They couldn’t be upfront about it, but they could let him have a little bit. She had to give him something. Atsuko had known though. She knew that she had to be good in order to keep the promise.

Riza felt sick to her stomach, thinking of how she’d tricked her son like that.

Typically during Halloween, Wojciech stayed behind her. He knew that his size  and appearance scared children. But both Aidan and Atsuko were too eager.  They drew him out, wanting to play with him and chase him around. Half the time, Wojciech walked to the door with Aidan, Bran, and their daemons while Riza, Rebecca, and her daemon stayed behind. Orion, Rebecca’s beautiful Asiatic cat daemon, would roll his eyes but say nothing in response when Wojciech came trotting back with candy in his mouth.

It was a good night. It could have been worse, but Wojciech stayed close to the kids, which seemed to be exactly what they wanted. Atsuko would flitter between Aidan and Wojciech, but he never turned into the form of a lion. There was one house where both Riza and Wojciech knew it almost happened. A woman asked what Aidan was for Halloween and he faltered in answering. Atsuko had changed into many forms before settling on a wolf cub.

“A sharp shooter like my mom!” Aidan finally proclaimed.

It wasn’t the truth. Somehow, it didn’t hurt more than Aidan wanting to be the Flame Alchemist like his father.

“You didn’t even try to persuade him otherwise?” Orion asked as they stepped into Rebecca and Havoc’s home for the Halloween party.

“What would have been the point of that?” Wojciech responded irritably. Riza bit her lip, almost hard enough to draw blood. These past few years had been hard on everyone, but she knew how irritable Wojciech was about the whole thing, seeing as how it was how she felt deep down. Neither one of them wanted to deny Aidan or Atsuko anything. They were their pride and joy. They were their everything.

Before, it had only been Roy and his goals, even Shula, but now there was this bright little boy and his sweet daemon and there were honestly times when Riza couldn’t figure out what else mattered. It was selfish of her to have had a child before they’d lived up to their promises and goals. At the moment, as Aidan played with Atsuko at pretending to be the Flame Alchemist, she didn’t care.

Atsuko was a good daemon. She was careful, just as Wojciech was. Despite how Aidan was feeling, she monitored what she turned into. It was too much to ask of a daemon her age, too much to ask of a child. Guilt seeped into Wojciech and bled into Riza. And yet neither child nor daemon asked questions or fought against it.

Tonight, though… Tonight, when she gave him the little gloves she’d stitched that transformed him from a regular Amestrian soldier into the Flame Alchemist, she gave him the word that his soul could be something more. She had known it would happen. She had known that she could stop if with a few words. And yet she hadn’t. She could not inflict such a rule on her son’s soul, his very being. This was his night.

Wojciech had pointed out earlier that it would happen and she had ignored it.

No one in the house said a word when Aidan, while dressed like the Flame Alchemist, popped into the room with a lion cub daemon.

Riza’s heart soared and broke at the same time. It was so beautiful and sweet. Her son looked like a carbon copy of his father. He stood up straight, tugged on his white gloves, and kept messing with his hair. Atsuko prowled around him in a lion cub form, somehow sleek already, radiating such strength compared to the daemons of the other children at the party. They both seemed so much older than the rest, wiser, braver, more knowing.

“You’re not going to be able to hide this much longer,” Orion sighed.

“You don’t think we know that?” Wojciech grumbled.

It wasn’t fair – not to Aidan or Atsuko. They just wanted to be loved. And they were loved, by parents and daemons both, but not in the way they should be. It hurt everyone. Wojciech was so tired of hiding it. Shula was ready to burst. Roy had warned her that he didn’t know how much longer his daemon could take it. Shula had attacked one reporter already, but she was ready to mangle any daemon that questioned them now, regardless of rank. She was large enough to do that. As a lionness, she was one of the largest daemons in the military.

“This will hurt them as much is makes them happy,” Rebecca pointed out.

Riza sighed. “I know.”

She could see the expression on Roy’s face now when he realized that his son had dressed up like the Flame Alchemist despite all odds. The joy, the relief, the pride. She could also understand what Shula would feel underneath all of those pure emotions when she saw Atsuko playing as a lion cub. The grief, the loss, the anger. Riza didn’t know what was worse. Both would hurt the two of them and there was nothing she could do to stop it. She saw all of it was a car about to crash.

And she did nothing.

Because she would sacrifice all of their happiness to preserve Aidan and Atsuko’s. She would bury herself and Roy in grief if her son smiled tonight. It was their burden to bear and she would do it as long as it meant that her boy was smiling. Roy would understand. Shula wouldn’t have it any other way. This was the life they chose. Wojciech never complained and neither could she.


End file.
